Bowdoin College Top Questions

Professors are very friendly and helpful. With such small classes all of them know your name, even if you choose to never talk during discussions. The course work is pretty strenuous, depending on what classes you're taking. I take a lot of humanities and probably spend on average anywhere from half an hour to 6+ hours a day on homework/reading/studying. It all depends on the week. It seems that students going the pre-Med route also do a lot of time in labs, with problem sets, and studying. Students aren't competitive. Everyone's just trying to work up to their own standard of excellence. The liberal arts degree is really geared towards learning for the sake of learning and getting involved in helping the common good. Intellectual conversations, in my experience, aren't that common outside of the classroom unless it's politics, which are more prevelant this year due to the election.

Academics at Bowdoin are wonderful. Professors go out of their way to get to know students. Usually professors have access to a photo roster before classes start, and work hard to memorize names. This can be daunting if you're in a class in which you've perhaps never spoken, and all of a sudden your professor calls on you by name, when perhaps you've always thought that your professor never knew who you were! It's hard to hide in a class at Bowdoin, but this makes learning so much easier, as you get engaged in the topic. I'm a Math major with a physics minor. Both the math and the physics departments are not frequented very often, but I prefer this, as it means that higher level class sizes are usually very small, and I get a lot of one-on-one attention. People in the math department were so thrilled when I declared my major, and I found that many professors in the department that I had never had already knew who I was, and I really appreciated being known in my department. Students spend a lot of time with professors outside of class. I frequently see my professors in the dining hall, having meals with either their family or with students. I've grabbed coffee with a professor before, and I know people who've babysat for their professor, or had Thanksgiving dinner at their professor's house.

All my professors know my name. My biggest class size has been 42 kids in an introductory government course. My favorite class is American Political Thought because of the professor. Students study a lot here, you need to to get good grades. The library can be full every night. Class participation is very common at Bowdoin, professors encourage new ideas and questions. Students commonly continue class discussions outside of class and engage in intellectual conversations about any subject. Although it is one of the most competitive schools to get into, the students are there for each other, helping each other and studying together. So far, the most unique course I've taken is Science, Magic and Religion, a course about pre-Darwinian thought and how the introduction of Darwin's evolution theory placed religion and science at odds. The academic requirements can be annoying if you think about them, but you will most likely fill most of them without intending to. I plan to major in Government and Legal Studies and Spanish. The Government department is the best department on campus and the language program at Bowdoin is phenomenal. The education at Bowdoin is definitely geared toward getting a job, there are advising groups all over campus, but in order to figure out what students want to do, advisors understand that learning for its own sake is important.

Classes are really varied. The intro classes are "large" 20-30 students. I've had classes with less than 10 students, and I'm a freshman. Classes are very engaging and rigorous, yet there is less competition in the classroom than there was in high school. The professors are hired based on how good they are at teaching, not how many papers they publish, so they tend to be personable, intelligent, and helpful. That being said, there aren't "easy" classes at Bowdoin.

I know all my professors really well. My favorite class was French last semester. My teacher was the nicest man ever, made everyone laugh, great teacher, and very fair.

yes, professors know my name. how much students study depends on the student like at any other school. class participation is fairly common, many classes are dicussion bsed. yes, sometimes we have intellectual conversations outside of class. this is less common if you are on the football or hockey team. or basketball. most students are not competitive, others are secretly competitive because they know that they will be shunned if they are open about it. i do not spend time with my professors out of class - if they were hotter i might. bowdoin's academic requirements are ridiculous and get more retarded every year. im glad im graduating and don't have to deal with all this crap anymore. and the education is geared toward's learning for its own sake (which is obvious since its an liberal arts college so if you want to be an engineer, don't come here)

Academics are great...I wish there weren't a science requirement because it wastes that professor's time as well as the students'. Students do have intellectual conversations outside of class but it's not all we talk about. Education at Bowdoin is about learning how think critically, articulate yourself, and write for any situation that you may be presented with in your life.

Professors dont' know your name unless you are tool who talks all the time in class or take a joke class with 10 people in it. Students never study. Class participation is common among 10{4a082faed443b016e84c6ea63012b481c58f64867aa2dc62fff66e22ad7dff6c} of the student body. Students are competitive. Education at Bowdoin is useless.

You might call me a math geek, but at Bowdoin, feeling passionate about something academic doesn't seem uncool or weird or anything like that. Everyone is just as passionate as me. I am currently taking a higher level math course in analysis that has only 11 students in the class. The work is really difficult but so incredibly interesting. During one class we made our way through a proof dealing with open sets and what are known as "open balls" and everyone literally said aloud, "wow." It was truly a moment of epiphany where things in math started to come together. Each day I'm amazed at how fast the two hours go by. In this particular class, all the assignments are done in groups of three or four. It brings up great discussions and is a really effective way to learn the proof techniques that analysis requires. The atmosphere of the class is great too. Everyone that has signed up to take it is really interested in the topics, not just filling a distribution requirement, which adds a lot to class and group discussions. This course has been one of my favorite academic experiences thus far at Bowdoin.

All of my professors know my name. My favorite class is the History of Women's Voices in America. The professor is passionate and the assigned texts are fascinating. Class participation is very common outside of 101 level courses. Most professors incorporate it in our final grades. Students are NOT competitive. We want each other to do well. The most unique class I have taken was titled Mona Lisa and the Mafia. It explores stereotypes of Italians by looking at famous works. Bowdoin's academic requirements are very easy to fulfill. They push us to expand out minds, bit not so much that we are very unhappy. Education at Bowdoin is geared towards education for education's sake. We have no Business or Finance classes, just Econ.